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Any of those will do the job but the best way to future proof your computer is to buy the most you can afford. More and more programs are being written to utilize all 4 cores and I think you will regret doing dual in a few years. I would go i7 if you can afford it.

If price is no concern and you're going to keep your Mac for a while, I'd recommend the i7 Quad-core. You can upgrade the memory yourself later on, so go with the 4G or whatever default is. With the proliferation of dual-core CPUs, application developers are making use of it more and more and the same will be true of quad-core when it becomes the defacto standard for all processors..

I wish I had enough money to buy you all an imac for giving me the advice. I use the machine for my small business.

My current Powerbook G4 cost me $2800 plus tax in 2004. It has been an amazingly reliable machine. The last computer that I had before that was a Gateway. It was obsolete a few months after I bought it and completely useless about 1 year after that.
My new camera shoots very large files and my Powerbook takes some time to handle them. Therefore it is time to upgrade.

Based on my calculations, my Powerbook cost me about $50 a month to own(so far).
I believe if I don't spend the money properly the first time I will have to make an additional purchase which will cost me far more money than the original costs of the upgrades.

I wish I had enough money to buy you all an imac for giving me the advice. I use the machine for my small business.

My current Powerbook G4 cost me $2800 plus tax in 2004. It has been an amazingly reliable machine. The last computer that I had before that was a Gateway. It was obsolete a few months after I bought it and completely useless about 1 year after that.
My new camera shoots very large files and my Powerbook takes some time to handle them. Therefore it is time to upgrade.

Based on my calculations, my Powerbook cost me about $50 a month to own(so far).
I believe if I don't spend the money properly the first time I will have to make an additional purchase which will cost me far more money than the original costs of the upgrades.

Have you check out Amazon's price? if you're a hardcore bargain hunter, maybe you can try AZ Viewer | Buy Amazon Products At Retail Price to help you monitor stuff on Amazon. It'll notify you instantly whenever there's available stock in Amazon & pay retail instead of 3rd party inflated prices....

If "price is no concern" I can't understand why someone would be debating which model iMac to buy..........if price is no concern then the MacPro is the obvious choice.

Now that I've got my shot out of the way, I concur with the advice to buy the most you can afford. For me, that choice was the fastest dual core, but I did upgrade the video card. If you're doing anything in 3D or animation I think it would be money well-spent.

I don't think software needing four cores is going to be coming all that fast from the simple reason that there's little market for it yet, AND that market isn't going to develop all that fast.

If "price is no concern" I can't understand why someone would be debating which model iMac to buy..........if price is no concern then the MacPro is the obvious choice.

Now that I've got my shot out of the way, I concur with the advice to buy the most you can afford. For me, that choice was the fastest dual core, but I did upgrade the video card. If you're doing anything in 3D or animation I think it would be money well-spent.

I don't think software needing four cores is going to be coming all that fast from the simple reason that there's little market for it yet, AND that market isn't going to develop all that fast.

Right now the i7 in the new iMac is probably a better choice than a 4 core MacPro. It's just a better processor for a better price. Then again, you do lose the upgradability factor. Hopefully the i9 will appear in the MacPro in the next few months and straiten things out.

As for software needing 4 cores, I don't think there is any but there is lots of software that will use all 4 cores if they are available. The more cores you have available, the more processing speed, the faster a job gets done. Ever used Handbrake? it will use all the processors and power you can throw at it and will peg my Quad G5 regularly.

Good points, and I didn't know about the different processor in the Pro. Quad core was a choice I was considering, but both the Apple guy at the local BestBuy and my salesperson at the dealer were the ones who actually suggested to get what I did, saying that it's so much faster and better on its own that I could use it for years and not need to be worried about upgrades.

Sorry, I don't know Handbrake. I've been away from Macs for some time; early OS 9 on a G3 PowerPC was my last Mac. I'll check it out.

My experience with Windows PCs, the way I use the machine, has been that upgrading the supporting hardware does more for giving me a sense of "faster and better" than does just sheer processor speed.

But everybody's mileage varies, and that's one reason why I'm not a fan of a closed system. We'll have to see how it works out.